I have found beekeeping dummy boards to be quite expensive, especially if you use 14×12 boxes like me (approx £7). As a result I have often done without, which has on occasion given me grief of brace comb to the… (READ MORE)

Winter and summer bees differ significantly in how long they live; 4-10 weeks (usually 6) for summer bees and up to 7 months for winter bees *. What I didn’t know is that this is predestined from their time as… (READ MORE)

It was May 1st; I never seem to get round to writing these things up when they happen. The weather had been very unusual, we’d had a warm winter, right through to early Feb and then cold and miserable right… (READ MORE)

http://www.gizmag.com/bee-obstacle-avoidance-drones/42675/ Dense forests crowded with branches and leaves provide quite the obstacle course for fast-moving insects. How they are able to identify gaps to move through seems to defy their small brains and low resolution eyesight. Researchers at Sweden’s Lund… (READ MORE)

http://www.naturalnews.com/053562_bee_colonies_population_decline_herbicides.html# “Our results suggest that current levels of pesticide exposure could be significantly affecting how bees are interacting with wild plants, and impairing the crucial pollination services they provide that support healthy ecosystem function,” he said. In other words, if… (READ MORE)

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-04/uoia-ssc033016.php Their study, reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that N. bombi was present in the U.S. as early as 1980, well before several species of wild bumble bees started to go missing across the… (READ MORE)

http://www.agprofessional.com/news/new-research-virus-transmissions-between-honey-bees Interspecific transfers of viruses between the western honey bee (Apis mellifera) and the eastern honey bee (Apis cerana) are rare, even if honey bees are kept in close proximity, new research reveals. Elevated global losses of managed western honey… (READ MORE)

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-03/asu-sab032916.php In two new studies, researchers from Arizona State University’s School of Life Sciences have discovered that the stress of short-term nutritional deprivation as larvae (baby bees) actually makes honey bees more resilient to starvation as adults.

Penelope Whitehorn, co-author of the study said: “Because neonicotinoids are neurotoxins and bees’ feeding is very complex, involving lots of different neurological mechanisms, I think it will undoubtedly be affected in some way by exposure to these pesticides.” ttp://m.heraldscotland.com/news/14386848.Scientists_make_new_discovery_about_how_bees_feed__giving_rise_to_new_concerns_about_pesticides/?ref=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ScottishNewsHeraldScotland+%28Scottish+News+%7C+Herald+Scotland%29